Ika and I flew to Semarang in Central Java on Friday and arrived at the airport in Tuban Bali at 2pm.
Our flight on Merpati was scheduled for 3pm and after a stop over in Surabaya in East Java we were due to arrive in Semarang at 7pm local time. Central Java is 1 hour behind Bali.
As we tried to check in at the airport we learned of a delay which meant take off would now be 5pm instead of 3pm, the final arrival time was unaffected though. We spent the time at one of the airport warungs serving Indonesian food. Prices are not bad initially and I always see the flight crews eating here. They do however chuck on a 20% service charge on top of everything. I had ayam goreng ( fried chicken) and Ika had a type of beef soup. Basic prices for dishes go for around 10,000rp.
I had a choice of Merpati and Mandala when booking. Indonesia has Garuda as the national carrier as well as several small domestic airlines. A few months ago a friend who works as a Cathay Pacific engineer told me about a guy who used to work for Cathay. He was so bad they let him go. For some reason Lion Air decided to make him their chief engineer and last year one of Lion Airs planes crashed in Solo Java. You get what you pay for I guess.
We landed on time in Semarang and the airport was definitely small time with a few booths for the expensive hotels are situated at Simpang Lima in the center of the city. These places are not cheap by any means and the cheapest room I saw was around $80 going up sharply. We settled on one called Hotel Santika just east of Simpang Siur where I paid 600,000rp for 2 nights. Our taxi ride there was 25,000rp and the ride was about 20 minutes.
The Deluxe room was decent, quite large with a queen size bed, tv, fridge, hot water etc. As usual mini bar prices were outrageous (20,000rp for a small Bintang 7,000rp in Circle K) and I did not feel the need to get raped in my own room.
We called Ikas parents and they asked if we could meet at our hotel. I asked Ika if her muslim parents would feel uncomfortable in our room seeing as how we had a double bed, she said they would be okay. After about 45 minutes they showed up and we got acquainted. Ikas mum smiles a lot and asks questions, her dad seems very shy and most of the time gazes in another direction, neither speaks English.
Her mum brought a stainless steel set of stackable pots with food in consisting of chicken, sambal goreng, chicken liver and ketupat (small compacted pyramids of rice). It was okay but its going to take a while for me to get used to the kampung style of Indonesian food which is more about random animal parts in a stinky sauce, than decoration.
We agreed to meet at their place just east of Semarang the next day to discuss things. I was pretty positive about how things went and wanted to be respectful. One time I caught myself pointing my leg and yanked it back in but Javanese seem very relaxed as far as the courtesy thing.
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My choice would be Mandala !
Good luck with the outlaws , mate.
Cheer Mick
I would have to agree, you guys look great.
2 nights for 600,000! Wow seems like a good rate for a city in Java. Is this because you used Ika’s Indonesian identity card? If I remember correctly, natives get a better rate than foreigners off the street if they can show an Indonesian identity card. I’m surprised the airlines haven’t cashed in on this.
Hhhhhmmmm….. sambal goreng , oh man… you make my mouth water. Did it have lots of the green petee? (stinky beans, yes, petee is an aquired taste, but once you get it, you are hooked. Just asked my wife.)
Barrie, thanks for the positive input as usual. Ika’s dad is shy but no overly interfering. I usually do okay with the food but still kampung food has another level of stinkyness.
Mick, thanks for the tip. Now let me give you one. There’s a Merpati flight attendent who does the Semarang-Surabaya run every sunday who is cantik sekali!
Chris, I’m sure we could of found a guest house type place but I was anticipation the in-laws coming over and I didn’t want a dingy room with a nasty bathroom. I could of had a standard room for 200,000rp but chose Deluxe.
Where have the archives gone, I can’t seem to find them. Congrats on the upcoming wedding etc
G’Day Nick,
Glad you got over meeting the in-laws. I reckon Ika’s dad is very protective of his daughter and I could see that in the foto.
Fotos - The foto of you and Ika is delightful. Geez mate, you even look like a married couple!. Seriously though, you both look serenely beautiful together.
kampung food is great eh. The best thing to do is not ask what it is, try not to look at it, and just shove it in your mouth and then smile!